DID MISSING PARACHUTE DISPLAY TEAM MEMBER LAND NEAR YOU?
PARACHUTE display team members are appealing for help tracing a comrade lost in action – Airborne Ted.
The stuffed toy jumped with The Pegasus Parachute Display Team during the Victory Show in Cosby on Sunday.
Former SAS commando Phil Tunnicliffe jumped with his team from their C-47 Dakota and flung the bear off into the skies to find its own way down with his own little parachute.
But several days later his exact landing spot has yet to be uncovered. Whoever discovers Airborne Ted will get to be a special guest at a future jump.
Phil said it was important they are reunited with their missing team member as soon as possible.
He said: “Ted is needed for an important operation in 10 days’ time when we fly to Arnhem to commemorate the 75th Anniversary of Operation Market Garden.”
Describing the jump, he said: “It was about 13.30hrs when we heard the familiar shout ‘Red on.’ Next thing our jump master Ian Marshall was screaming ‘Go, go, go!’ and one by one we leapt into the maelstrom of the huge twin-engined aircraft’s slipstream.
“We watched as our parachute canopies billow out above us before forming into that beautiful and very reassuring fully-open shape.
“Then it was time to dispatch Airborne Ted, who I’d been safely holding on to as my parachute deployed.
“Ted’s canopy opened immediately and then in a flash he was gone, caught by some freak gust of wind or thermal that carried him off into the far distance. And that’s the last we saw of him.”
He said Ted probably landed somewhere in the area between Narborough, Cosby and Huncote.
He said: “We have had many reports of him floating by from observers on the ground and have some idea of where he may have landed but it’s a considerable area.
“Despite the rain and the open country side, Ted is more than capable of surviving due to the training he received but he may well be cold wet and muddy after being dragged by his parachute. Let’s bring Ted home!”
The person who reunites Airborne Ted with his team will be invited to spend a day with them at one of their displays. The day will included a guided tour of the C-47 Dakota, which was used to drop paratroopers for the D-Day invasion of France and later at Arnhem.
The aircraft still has marks from 40 bullet holes, which have been repaired but are still visible.
The lucky person will also get the best views of the jump and be invited to take part in the team photograph.
The Pegasus Parachute Display Team is made up of ex-servicemen, mostly from the Parachute Regiment, and are the only team in the UK authorised to jump using round parachutes such as those used in the Second World War.
The Dakota they jumped from at the Victory Show was a genuine Second World War aircraft.